The New Covenant - Trust and Spirituality

Introduction

Matthew 6:25–34 KJV 1900

25 Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? 26 Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they? 27 Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature? 28 And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: 29 And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. 30 Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which to day is, and to morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith? 31 Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed? 32 (For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. 33 But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you. 34 Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.

Body

Doubt

“Negative Faith”, “Faith in reverse”, etc.

This is where we do not believe God will do what He said He would do.

What if we had a guarantee from God He would answer our prayer. Guaranteed! But there was no time frame.

How long would we pray for something before we gave up?

How inconvenienced would we allow ourselves to become before we decided it wasn’t worth it?

Is it possible that sometimes, our “doubt” is really a reluctance to fight?

We must not doubt God’s Word in any area, but we must also be willing to apply God’s Word in real world scenarios no matter the cost to us.

Trusting in God

Trusting in God is much more than paying God lip service

Before we get into specifics, we all understand that trusting in God is a good and wise thing.

Is there any instance in Scripture where we see that God failed?

When has someone trusted in God and later regretted it?

When has someone not trusted in God and later were glad they didn’t?

All through the Bible we see examples of people who both trusted in God, and who failed to trust in God, and we can see the results they reaped.

Adam and Eve — Couldn’t trust in God for a true understanding of good and evil. They needed to discover this themselves.

The Ten Spies — Failed to trust in God to deliver the Canaanites into their hand, and paid the price.

Numbers 14:11–12 KJV 1900

11 And the Lord said unto Moses, How long will this people provoke me? and how long will it be ere they believe me, for all the signs which I have shewed among them? 12 I will smite them with the pestilence, and disinherit them, and will make of thee a greater nation and mightier than they.

The kings of Judah and Israel — When they trusted in God and were obedient to His commands, they had victory. When they trusted in their own strength, or enlisted help from other nations without seeking God, they experienced humiliating defeat.

Noah — Trusted in God even though rain had never occured. His faith in God lead to the salvation of him and his family.

Abraham — Trusted in God to raise up Isaac from the dead if need be.

Moses — His faith in God never wavered no matter what impossible situation Israel was placed in.

Here we are commanded two distinct things:

To focus our energy and our attention on God’s kingdom and His business.

To trust in God for our daily natural provision.

What does that mean exactly? How does that play out?

Again, this is more than paying God lip service. We are required to actually follow our beliefs through with action.

This becomes easier for us once we get a handle on our second point:

The Preeminence of the Spiritual World

When we understand that the spiritual world supersedes, or takes precedence over the natural world, we can get a better understanding of how all this works.

2 Corinthians 10:4 KJV 1900

4 (For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;)

Here we get a glimpse of one huge difference between the two

The spiritual is “mighty through God” — it’s strong, it’s potent, and it’s effective.

The natural by contrast is depicted as weak, impotent, and ineffective.

Keep in mind this is from the perspective of the spiritual.

We can achieve results using purely natural means, but those results will be confined to the natural and have no bearing on the spiritual.

Example: An alcoholic who quits drinking

Through strength of will I can decide to abstain from alcohol for the rest of my life.

I will always be an alcoholic however, and one drink is generally all it would take for me to plunge back into it again.

I have no deliverance, only cessation of the activity.

If we are to achieve true, lasting changes in both the natural AND the spiritual, we must use spiritual means.

Example: Deliverance from alcoholism

Cannot be achieved in the natural, but God can completely deliver someone from alcohol addiction.

The effect is in the natural — my body is addicted to and craves alcohol.

The transformation happens in the spiritual — God miraculously frees me from my bondage to alcohol.

The results are both natural and spiritual — My body no longer craves alcohol, and my spirit is freed to serve Jesus Christ.

A lot of things we see in the natural are the results of activity in the spiritual.

People pray against a strip club and one day you notice it went out of business.

You’re obedient to scripture and pay your tithes and offerings, and God begins to bless you in your finances.

You pray for someone’s salvation, and they end up in a situation that is the perfect catalyst for them to come to God.

Tying it Together

When we begin to see how the spiritual affects the natural, we begin to understand why Jesus is commanding us the way He is.

We are to focus on the spiritual because:

That’s the best bang for our buck!

We were created for higher and greater things.

We let God focus on the natural because the most powerful and lasting events we experience in the natural are really the results of spiritual activity.

Conclusion

We must trust God to the exclusion of everything and everyone else. When God says something will happen, there’s nothing in all of reality that can stop it from happening. When we’re obedient to God’s Word, every promise in the Book is available to us.